CAA News Today
Obama Intends to Nominate Jim Leach as NEH Chairman
posted Jun 04, 2009
Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate former Republican Congressman Jim Leach as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Obama said, “I am confident that with Jim as its head, the National Endowment for the Humanities will continue on its vital mission of supporting the humanities and giving the American public access to the rich resources of our culture. Jim is a valued and dedicated public servant and I look forward to working with him in the months and years ahead.”
Jim Leach served as a member of the US House of Representatives for the state of Iowa for thirty years. He founded and cochaired the Congressional Humanities Caucus, which is dedicated to advocating on behalf of the humanities in the House and to raising the profile of humanities in the United States. The caucus worked to promote and preserve humanities programs and commissions such as the Historical Publications and Records Commission. Leach and his cofounder, Rep. David Price, received the Sidney R. Yates Award for Distinguished Public Service to the Humanities from the National Humanities Alliance in 2005. During his tenure in Congress, Leach also served as chairman of the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services (1995-2001), a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations, and chairman of the committee’s Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs (2001-6). In addition, Leach is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the vice chairman of the Century Foundation’s board of trustees and has served on the boards of the Social Sciences Research Council, ProPublica, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Kettering Foundation. Since leaving Congress in 2007, he has taught at Princeton University and served as the interim director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Obama Intends to Nominate Jim Leach as NEH Chairman
posted Jun 04, 2009
Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to nominate former Republican Congressman Jim Leach as Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Obama said, “I am confident that with Jim as its head, the National Endowment for the Humanities will continue on its vital mission of supporting the humanities and giving the American public access to the rich resources of our culture. Jim is a valued and dedicated public servant and I look forward to working with him in the months and years ahead.”
Jim Leach served as a member of the US House of Representatives for the state of Iowa for thirty years. He founded and cochaired the Congressional Humanities Caucus, which is dedicated to advocating on behalf of the humanities in the House and to raising the profile of humanities in the United States. The caucus worked to promote and preserve humanities programs and commissions such as the Historical Publications and Records Commission. Leach and his cofounder, Rep. David Price, received the Sidney R. Yates Award for Distinguished Public Service to the Humanities from the National Humanities Alliance in 2005. During his tenure in Congress, Leach also served as chairman of the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services (1995-2001), a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations, and chairman of the committee’s Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs (2001-6). In addition, Leach is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the vice chairman of the Century Foundation’s board of trustees and has served on the boards of the Social Sciences Research Council, ProPublica, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Kettering Foundation. Since leaving Congress in 2007, he has taught at Princeton University and served as the interim director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
June 2009 Issue of The Art Bulletin Published
posted Jun 02, 2009
The June 2009 issue of The Art Bulletin, the leading publication of art-historical scholarship, has just been published. It will be mailed to those CAA members who elect to receive it, and to all institutional members.
On the cover is a detail of a pillowcase designed ca. 1916 by the Swiss artist Sophie Taeuber, which accompanies an essay by Bibiana Obler that considers the difference between Taeuber’s and Hans Arp’s public and private identities through a set of collaborative and closely related works and why they kept their most “advanced” work to themselves.
For her contribution, Stephanie Leitch investigates Hans Burgkmair’s images of non-Western communities in the woodcut frieze The Peoples of Africa and India (1508), which neither played into iconographic presets nor invented new stereotypes. Two more essays round out the issue: Norma Broude explores the political dynamics of gender informing the intentions, subjects, production, and reception of Giambattista Tiepolo’s frescoes for the palazzina of the Villa Valmarana, and Laura Morowitz examines the extraordinary popularity and religious undercurrents of the Hungarian artist Mihály Munkácsy’s paintings Christ before Pilate and Christ on Golgotha in late-nineteenth-century America.
The June issue of The Art Bulletin also contains reviews of books on Chinese epigraphy, Giovanni Bellini, Lucas Cranach the Elder, and Marcel Duchamp. Please read the full table of contents for more details.
Spring Meiss Grant Winners
posted May 29, 2009
CAA has awarded three grants from the Millard Meiss Publication Fund for spring 2009. Thanks to the generous bequest of the late Prof. Millard Meiss, these grants are given twice annually to publishers to support the publication of scholarly books in art history and related fields.
The grantees are:
- Anna Arnar, The Book as Instrument: Stéphane Mallarmé, the Artist’s Book, and the Transformation of Print Culture, University of Chicago Press
- Nehabat Avcioglu, Turkish Architecture in Europe, 1737–1876, Ashgate
- Bissera Pentcheva, The Sensual Icon: Ritual, Space, and the Senses in Byzantium, Pennsylvania State University Press
Books eligible for a Meiss grant must already be under contract with a publisher and be on a subject in the arts or art history. Authors must be current CAA members.
Please note that the Millard Meiss Publication Fund has been suspended for fall 2009–spring 2010.
MLA and HASTAC Developing Tenure Guidelines for Digital Scholarship
posted May 27, 2009
“Even as the use of electronic media has become common across fields for research and teaching,” reports Scott Jaschik at Insider Higher Ed, “what is taken for granted among young scholars is still foreign to many of those who sit on tenure and promotion committees.”
While junior professors lament the exclusion or diminution from tenure reviews of their born-digital work, whether publication or project, the Modern Language Association (MLA) and a group called the Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology Advanced Collaboratory (HASTAC) are tackling the issue head on with new guides that offer tenure committees help in properly evaluating digital scholarship. MLA’s Information Technology Committee is developing these guides through a wiki, which publishes both finished and in-progress work.
In his article, “Tenure in a Digital Era,” Jaschik examines the many perceptions and problems at issue, including peer review; digital and print publications; and work that crosses traditional categories of research, teaching, and service.
NEH Funding Request for FY 2010
posted May 20, 2009
“Serious long-term challenges posed by rapid globalization, economic crisis, and threats to our national security require solutions informed by the humanities,” wrote Pauline Yu, president of the American Council of Learned Societies, in a testimony submitted last month to the House of Representations in support of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Yu called for at least $230 million in funding for the NEH for fiscal year 2010—an increase of $75 million above the present year’s budget. (Download and read Yu’s full testimony to the Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies.)
Earlier this month, however, President Barack Obama’s FY 2010 budget allotted only $171.315 million for the endowment, far short of Yu’s request but $16.315 million more than the current year.
With this proposed increase, the NEH seeks to establish a new grant program, entitled Sustaining Cultural Heritage Collections, which will allow institutions to plan or implement preventative conservation measures that prolong the useful life of humanities collections. The endowment will also reintroduce preservation research and development grants for projects that address major challenges in preserving and maintaining access to humanities collections and resources. And through its We the People program, the NEH will continue to fund humanities projects that strengthen the teaching, study, and understanding of the nation’s history and culture.
Additionally, Obama’s request includes new oversight responsibility for the National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs program. With the program’s transfer from the US Commission of Fine Arts, the NEH will manage a redesigned program of competitive grants to arts, historical, and cultural institutions in the District of Columbia.
In addition to a general overview of Obama’s NEH budget request, more information is available in the summary and highlights or the detailed budget request of the endowment’s FY 2010 appropriation request. A table with the FY 2010 funding request figures, by division and office with FY 2008 and FY 2009 appropriation amounts, is also available.
See also a brief report on funding for the National Endowment for the Art for FY 2010.
NEH Funding Request for FY 2010
posted May 20, 2009
“Serious long-term challenges posed by rapid globalization, economic crisis, and threats to our national security require solutions informed by the humanities,” wrote Pauline Yu, president of the American Council of Learned Societies, in a testimony submitted last month to the House of Representations in support of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Yu called for at least $230 million in funding for the NEH for fiscal year 2010—an increase of $75 million above the present year’s budget. (Download and read Yu’s full testimony to the Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies.)
Earlier this month, however, President Barack Obama’s FY 2010 budget allotted only $171.315 million for the endowment, far short of Yu’s request but $16.315 million more than the current year.
With this proposed increase, the NEH seeks to establish a new grant program, entitled Sustaining Cultural Heritage Collections, which will allow institutions to plan or implement preventative conservation measures that prolong the useful life of humanities collections. The endowment will also reintroduce preservation research and development grants for projects that address major challenges in preserving and maintaining access to humanities collections and resources. And through its We the People program, the NEH will continue to fund humanities projects that strengthen the teaching, study, and understanding of the nation’s history and culture.
Additionally, Obama’s request includes new oversight responsibility for the National Capital Arts and Cultural Affairs program. With the program’s transfer from the US Commission of Fine Arts, the NEH will manage a redesigned program of competitive grants to arts, historical, and cultural institutions in the District of Columbia.
In addition to a general overview of Obama’s NEH budget request, more information is available in the summary and highlights or the detailed budget request of the endowment’s FY 2010 appropriation request. A table with the FY 2010 funding request figures, by division and office with FY 2008 and FY 2009 appropriation amounts, is also available.
See also a brief report on funding for the National Endowment for the Art for FY 2010.
Study Finds Overreliance on Part-Time Faculty in Higher Education
posted May 18, 2009
The primary finding of a report released last week by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), entitled American Academic: The State of the Higher Education Workforce 1997–2007, presents a troubling picture of disinvestment in the higher-education teaching profession—notably, a reduction in the proportion of full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty, and an increased reliance on employing “contingent” faculty and instructors such as part-time faculty, full-time nontenure track faculty, and graduate employees.
An analysis of the most recent ten years of national data finds that the higher-education instructional workforce grew in the past decade, which is not surprising since college enrollments increased during that time by over 3 million. But to meet the needs of a growing student population, colleges and universities overwhelmingly relied on hiring undersupported contingent faculty and instructors. Previous reports have demonstrated the problems created when colleges hire contingent faculty and instructors without fair wages, job security, and professional support. This new report documents that, rather than working to reverse these trends and investing in a more secure higher-education teaching workforce, colleges and universities are expanding their reliance on contingent faculty and instructors.
Among the report’s other key findings:
- From 1997 to 2007, the proportion of full-time tenured and tenure-track faculty members declined from approximately one-third of the instructional staff to slightly more than one-quarter
- The increased reliance on contingent faculty and instructors was found in all sectors of higher education, with the most dramatic increase in community colleges
At the same time, the study notes an increase in the number of professional staff who provide direct student services, such as registrars, counselors, and financial-aid officers. Professional staff grew by 50 percent from 1997 to 2007, and the vast majority of these positions were full-time.
This report is the first in a new series on the higher-education workforce in colleges and universities. Each issue in AFT’s American Academic series will explore different aspects of trends in hiring, compensation, and working conditions among the increasingly diverse higher-education workforce. More higher education data can be found in AFT’s Higher Education Data Center.
The Chronicle of Higher Education and Insider Higher Ed have reported on the report, with extensive comments by readers posted to the latter article.
CAA encourages all colleges and universities to read and uphold its Guidelines for Part-Time Professional Employment, which give recommendations on fair compensation, office and studio space, benefits, and more for part-time workers.
May Obituaries in the Arts
posted May 13, 2009
CAA recognizes the lives and achievements of the following artists, art historians, and theorists. Of special note are two obituaries written especially for CAA: Richard R. Ranta on Carol Purtle, and Clark V. Poling on John Howett.
- Ernie Barnes, an artist who was also a professional football player, died on April 27, 2009, at the age of 70
- John Howett, a professor emeritus of art history at Emory University, died on April 8, 2009, at the age of 82
- Jack Prip, a silversmith who taught for many years at the Rhode Island School of Design, died on April 8, 2009. He was 86
- Carol Purtle, a professor of art history at the University of Memphis, died on December 12, 2008, at the age of 69
- David W. Scott, an artist, art historian, and founding director of the National Museum of American Art, died on March 30, 2009. He was 92
- Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, a literary theorist and pioneer of queer studies, died on April 12, 2009, at the age of 58
- Honoré Sharrer, a figurative American artist who rose to prominence in the 1940s, died on April 17, 2009. She was 88
Read all past obituaries in the arts on the CAA website.
John Howett: In Memoriam
posted May 13, 2009
Clark V. Poling is professor emeritus of art history at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.
John Howett
John Howett, professor of art history at Emory University for thirty years, died on April 8, 2009, at the age of 82. A founding member of the Art History Department and active with numerous arts organizations in Atlanta, he nurtured the careers of many artists and undergraduate and graduate students both in art history and in the interdisciplinary Graduate Institute of the Liberal Arts.
After serving with the US infantry in the Philippines and Japan during World War II, Howett began his career in art as a student at the John Herron Art Institute in Indianapolis, Indiana, earning a BFA. He received an MA and PhD from the University of Chicago in Illinois, specializing in early Italian Renaissance art; during this time he was curator of the University of Notre Dame Art Gallery as well as associate professor at that university.
Arriving at Emory in 1966, Howett helped develop the Art History Department and its graduate program, summer-abroad program in Europe, and collection of works of art on paper, which subsequently became part of Emory’s Michael C. Carlos Museum. He was revered as a teacher and mentor, having received the Emory Williams Distinguished Teaching Award, the Award for Outstanding Teaching and Service to Undergraduate Students, and the Arts and Sciences Award of Distinction. Recently, a former student established the John Howett Travel Fund for Advanced Undergraduate Seminars in Art History in his honor.
Howett was instrumental in the decision to select Michael Graves as the architect of the Carlos Museum. In recognition of his contributions there, including serving as curator for a number of exhibitions of works on paper, a gallery in the museum is named in his honor, as is the newly established John Howett Works on Paper Fund. Howett has also been awarded the Woolford B. Baker Award for service to the museum and the arts at Emory.
When Howett arrived in Atlanta in the sixties, the civil rights movement was at its height, and he became active in antiwar and social-justice efforts. He was an ardent supporter of the arts community in the city, serving on the boards of the Atlanta College of Art, Art Papers, the Arts Festival of Atlanta, Nexus Contemporary Art Center, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Georgia. A board member of the High Museum of Art for two decades, he helped in the choice of Richard Meier as architect of its new building completed in 1983. The many exhibitions for which he served as curator—at the High, the Carlos, and galleries in Atlanta—included contemporary art as well as Renaissance and Baroque illuminations, prints, and drawings. His championing of Atlanta artists in exhibitions and publications aided many careers and contributed to the burgeoning arts community.
Howett was a model of the publicly engaged academic: kind, humorous, wise, and spirited in navigating the shoals of university politics and bureaucracy and bridging the gap between academia and the broader community.